Physician Finance Minute

Being a resident and working the crazy, unpredictable hours can put any relationship to the test. Trying to juggle childcare during these years is no easy task either. Fortunately though, with careful planning, there are several options available to you and your family as you try to balance daycare and life as a resident. For instance, have you considered hiring an Au Pair?

Several financial terms are thrown around when it comes to student loans, especially as you’re financing your medical career. One of them you will hear quite often is a reference to refinancing. Similar to a refinance of your home mortgage, you can potentially combine all of your loans into one payment with the goal of having a lower interest rate or a lower monthly payment.

To really maximize your financial success while you’re in residency, you should choose an income-driven repayment option for your federal student loan payments. A repayment plan is calculated by taking your annual income, family size, and location into account. This can mean a much lower monthly payment towards your debt.

An important step in receiving loan forgiveness through PSLF is to submit an Employee Certification form annually. You can find all of the information for filling out the form, where to send it, what information is needed, etc. by going through the Department of Education website. The form is simple to fill out and shouldn’t take too much of your time.

The word “forbearance” just sounds depressing and like something you want to avoid altogether. Think of forbearance as a temporary suspension of payments towards your federal student loans. Many physicians who are completing their residency will qualify for the forbearance option of their federal loans because it falls under the “financial hardship” category.

As a physician, you probably receive a lot of financial advice about what you should be doing. But does anyone ever tell you what you need to avoid in order to potentially save thousands? For those of you that are in your residency program, there are several financial decisions you can make to keep you from costly mistakes – especially when it comes to student loans. The first mistake you want to avoid while you’re a resident is not consolidating your medical student loans.

When you took out your student loans years ago to pay for your medical education, did you spend much time thinking about how you would actually repay the amount you owe? Chances are probably not but eventually, you will have to have a plan to repay your loans.

We all know sometimes you have to learn from your mistakes. But that advice hardly makes you feel better when you feel your circumstances are stacked against you. When it comes to tackling credit card debt it’s important to know that you can learn from your mistakes. In order to retire, you need to destroy all bad debt from your life and rid yourself of the frivolous spending that got you there in the first place.

Whether it’s credit card debt or even student loan debt, the way you think about debt can have a great impact on your overall financial success. Once you pay off your credit card debt, it’s important to change your outlook on money to avoid falling back into the familiar debt trap again.

Tackling the credit card debt is not an easy task, but it’s one of the best things you can do to set yourself up for financial success. Fortunately there are several steps you can take to help you tackle the debt once and for all. We’ve talked before about analyzing your spending habits and cutting out unnecessary expenses. After that it’s on to creating a budget that you can realistically live within.